Drug resistances at Plasmodium falciparum: Updated recommendations for malaria prophylaxis

The battle against malaria is always competing with time. Resistances have occurred to every broad introduced antimalarial in the end. Even the highly potential, promising artemisinins are in danger of losing their efficacy as prolonged parasite clearance time in some South East Asian regions indicates. The WHO called for a general ban of monotherapy treatment of falciparum malaria. At present, first- and second-line treatment worldwide is artemisinin combination therapy (ACT). The additional administration of transmission blocking treatment is propagated especially in areas with resistances. However, recommendations for prophylaxis and emergency treatment contain only minor changes concerning the known antimalarials compared to recent years. The recommendation of doxycycline as prophylaxis has to be emphasized.